ADHD Kids May Have Weaker Brain Connections

Kids who have ADHD may have weaker connections among the brain's networks that focus the mind, concludes a study at the Stanford University School of Medicine.

Using MRI brain scans from 180 children with and without ADHD, researchers found that kids with the disorder showed weaker interactions among networks involved in focusing attention. In addition -- the more severe a child's attention problems, the weaker those brain connections were.

Those networks help the brain decide which pieces of informamtion deserve the most attention. If the interaction among the networks is lacking, a person might get stuck in a daydream rather than tackling the task at hand.

Even so, it’s still unclear if these weaker connections actually cause ADHD. Another unanswered question is whether weak connections among these brain networks can be strengthened.

In the U.S. alone, more than 6 million school-age children and teens have been diagnosed with ADHD, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.